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Applied Physics Letters -- July 19, 1999 -- Volume 75, Issue 3, pp. 346-348

Transmission electron microscopy investigation of Co thin films on GaAs(001)

M. A. Mangan, G. Spanos, T. Ambrose, and G. A. Prinz

Materials Science and Technology Division, Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC 20375

(Received 25 February 1999; accepted 24 May 1999)

Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) observations of the microstructure of epitaxial Co thin films on GaAs(001) are reported. Cross-sectional TEM confirmed both bcc-Co and hcp-Co exist in a single 345 Å film. During film growth by molecular beam epitaxy, the epitaxial bcc-Co layer forms first at the GaAs interface, and hcp-Co islands subsequently form at the free surface of the bcc-Co layer when it reaches a thickness of about 145 Å. The bcc-Co film is single crystal at early stages of growth, but later may develop into multiple bcc crystals. The final hcp-Co grain size is roughly 15–20 nm, and selected area electron diffraction showed these grains are strongly textured. Four previously unreported variants of the hcp-Co/GaAs orientation relationship were observed in which the c axis of the hcp unit cell lies out of the plane of the film.

PII: S0003-6951(99)02529-2
doi:10.1063/1.124370
PACS: 68.55.Jk, 81.15.Hi, 68.35.Bs        Additional Information

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